Now, learn asanas to become teacher

Following the direction of Union Human Resource Development Minister Smriti Irani, the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE) has announced making Yoga education compulsory for all from the current academic session.

“We are going to introduce Yoga education as a new subject in the existing curriculums of B.Ed, M.Ed and Diploma in Elementary Education (D.El.Ed) programmes. Aspiring teachers would now have to study Yoga and qualify the Yoga exam paper to get the degrees of B.Ed, M.Ed and diploma programmes," said NCTE Chairman Santosh Panda on the sidelines of Rashtriya Yoga Shikshak Sammelan.

Adding further, Panda said, “Since Yoga education is all about learning and practicing different asanas, the major part of the course will be practical in nature. There will just 20 per cent marks for the theory paper and the rest 80 <g data-gr-id="24">per cent</g> will be evaluated through practical.” It’s worth mentioning that NCTE is a statutory regulatory of HRD and regulates the course content of different teacher education programmes run by universities across the country.

According to officials in the HRD Ministry, the NCTE has initiated preparing the curriculum under guidance of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Yoga teacher Prof HR Nagendra, who is also Chancellor of Swamy Vivekananda Yoga Anusandhan Samsthana (S-VYASA). Nagendra has been roped in by the HRD Ministry to advise the NCTE in syllabus preparation. The team of S-VYASA University and NCTE has held <g data-gr-id="25">several</g> round of consultation to devise the syllabus.

According to HRD officials, the curriculum will be implemented in all the teachers education programme from July. Yoga education for B.Ed level would include <g data-gr-id="21">introduction</g> to yoga and yogic practices, introduction to yogic text and guidelines.